Can You Hear Me Now?

phonebooth“But to do good and to communicate forget not: for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.”  Hebrews 13:16

Depending on which translation you use, this Scripture gets pretty broad!  Many of the translations leave it simply at “communicate,” while others signify a transference, such as giving.  I want to address it for the simpler version–just plain good communication–and attempt to show you why I believe God is pleased when His children don’t neglect to interact properly with others.

One of the greatest weapons the enemy has against the body of Christ is one of our own making, and that is neglect to communicate.  We can spew out our colorful cliches and not be short on humor, metaphor, and empty words–just like the world–but we can get pretty tongue-tied when it comes to using our words to show respect and common courtesy.  I have been in church for an entire lifetime; and I’ve seen withheld communication destroy, wound, divide, and offend just as thoroughly and just as often as backbiting and gossip!

Why do we have such a hard time with extending this gesture, when we ourselves hate to be on the lack-of-receiving end of communication?  I don’t know about you, but I feel my tension levels rise and grind away at my peace whenever I’m waiting on an acknowledgment, and I know someone is choosing just not to respond.  Having been there many, many times over the years, it’s help me be more aware of how much more careful I need to be when dealing with others who are waiting on me.

Did you know that you don’t have to have the problem solved in order to communicate?  There’s not a thing wrong with, “Just getting back with you to let you know that even though I don’t have such-and-such ready yet, I did receive your request and I’m working on it;” or, “I’m really sorry, but I just can’t be there on Tuesday evening this time.  Maybe next time.”  We need to be more thoughtful of others in this way!  When someone is counting on us to be at our designated post–whether serving as a volunteer coach for the soccer team, a church usher, or even showing up for work–it is a good reflection on our Father when we are tenacious enough to contact our leaders or the person whom we’re serving whenever we cannot do what we have committed to do.  I would go so far as to say, when we know ahead of time that we cannot follow through, we should always consider what the other person may have to do in order to fill our vacancy.  Sure, I know that ‘s not always possible…but it goes a long way with other people when you don’t leave them hung out to dry!  Do your best to accommodate others, and to let them know you respect and value their time, too.

So this sounds almost like an employee manual, I realize–but as ambassadors of Christ, we are called to go above and beyond.  If on the job, you are the only believer on a crew of sinners, it’s a terrible thing to have it said of you that the one who calls himself/herself a Christian is the laziest, least reliable, or hardest to work with of the whole team.  In the secular workforce, I heard that said of one person or another several times over the years; and while I felt bad for the Christian who was standing out for the wrong reasons, I felt sooooo much worse for Jesus, Whose name was insulted by association with someone who was not diligent…and a neglectful communicator.

You don’t have to have the gift of writing or speaking to be a good communicator, but you do have to have a few other qualities, such as:

  1.  Consideration for others.  What difficulties are you causing by failing to touch base, check in, offer your assistance or prayer or just an ear?  What open doors do you create by taking time to acknowledge and show respect for someone else?
  2. Accountability.  A follower of Christ should have absolutely no issue with being above-board, honest,  a submitter to authority, and thoughtful to others in general (even those to whom we don’t “owe” accountability).
  3. Humility.  Sometimes the other person doesn’t need a lecture; he or she needs for you to listen and show empathy.  You’ll never be able to do that if you’re all the time trying to fix the other person!  Think…remove the beam in my own eye, then I can help remove the speck in my brother’s!
  4. Humility again!  Don’t use “the silent treatment” as a way to punish your spouse, your child, or any other person.  We need to check our spirit when we find pleasure in letting someone sweat.  I’m not going to say that there’s never an appropriate time for us to delay a response, but the Holy Spirit knows when we’re using this tactic to get revenge or to manipulate.
  5. Quickness to repent.  If you are wrong, be willing to acknowledge it (by communicating such) and change!  Don’t stubbornly pack your withheld apology around.  A mature believer will sometimes follow the Holy Spirit’s lead and be the FIRST to extend the olive branch–even when he or she was in the right!  Blessed are the peacemakers…and sometimes peacemakers have to be the icebreakers.
  6. Quickness to forgive.  First of all, we need God’s forgiveness and cannot therefore afford to withhold forgiveness from others.  Second, unforgiveness can cause us to alienate our people!  Think of how many people have just started out a little mad over something, and because they kept nursing hurt feelings, suddenly found themselves five, twenty, fifty years down the road not speaking to a family member.  The longer we defer forgiveness, we sear our consciences with a hot iron.  The longer we go without communicating, the easier it is to alienate loved ones.
  7. An ear toward heaven.  If you pray for the spirit of discernment, God can absolutely help you foresee potential trainwrecks in relationships.  Entire churches have split before over hurts…many times because leaders have failed to seal the cracks when an offense came.  Truthfully?  It’s easier to look the other way and hope something doesn’t fester; however, the devil usually doesn’t pass on an easy opportunity to de-rail a move of God.  Often we don’t know HOW to respond, so we do nothing.  Or, we feel the other person is just immature and being unreasonable, so we hope that time will cause the storm to blow over.  If you see someone bordering on leaving over an unacknowledged offense, prayerfully ask God how best to handle it.  At least be willing to make the communication, even if it doesn’t end as you’d hoped.  Once the door closes behind him or her, the chance of getting back your relationship with an offended brother or sister is, as Proverbs said, “harder to win than a fortified city;” AND, the biggest slap in the face of all is if that association is broken in profound silence.
  8. Openness without nagging.  We are sure good at giving TMI (too much information) on Facebook about everything from our skin rashes to our spouse’s bad habits, but not so open in places where it counts.  When you are on the receiving end of a hurt, give the other person a chance to make it right by voicing (nicely) what has happened.  Carefully choose your words to express your FEELINGS, not your assessment of that person’s character.  Those “you always” and “you never” accusations don’t work and can send the other person retreating like a chicken with its tail feathers on fire.  Instead of “you never spend time with me anymore,” try “I miss our time together…I enjoy being with you.”  A soft answer turns away wrath, but no answer at all doesn’t do much of anything.   It’s ok to be transparent with someone else when the goal is restoration, and preventive maintenance!
  9. Gratitude.  If someone–and especially if that someone is in your immediate circle–does something for you, for heaven’s sake, thank him or her!  My pastor and his entire family are masters of this trait…and are so thoughtful and appreciative over every little thing.  From the time their grown kids were just little, even they were constantly saying ‘thank you’ or ‘I really appreciate that/you.’  Folks are drawn to grateful people.  Show that someone’s thoughtfulness impacted you, and that someone go out of his or her way to accommodate you in the future.  And when you’re being served in a restaurant, don’t fail to praise those who are taking care of you (instead of complaining about everything)…and put your money where your mouth is, too!  For heaven’s sake, Christians, don’t leave a tract in place of a tip.  Gratitude is a catalyst to generosity; and if you want that server to view your God as a stingy, unfriendly, unappreciative tyrant in the sky, you’ll be stingy, unfriendly, and unappreciative over your meal.  Every encounter with others is a reflection, to the good or to the bad, on our Heavenly Father, Whom we represent.  Bring the salt and light through the door with you.  I’ve known believers who’ve won servers to the Lord right in the restaurant, just for listening and offering to pray for them.  Many times the person taking care of you is a big ball of hurt and desperation.  Even now it surprises me how often I encounter someone in this setting who is desperate to just be acknowledged.
  10. Positive and encouraging.  Don’t always offer a story about how your problem (or former crisis) was even worse than the one your contact is going through.  If someone’s mother just died, he or she doesn’t need to hear you amble on and on about what all you went through when yours did!  No matter what situation you’re helping someone walk out, find a way to end it on a good note (and not by using cliches like the silver lining in the cloud).  Sometimes a simple, “We will trust God together to bring you through this” will do. Listen more than you speak.  When you are interacting with others, sneak opportunities to compliment and encourage them in appropriate ways.  Tell people when they’re doing a good job, and if they’re not, you can still turn the tide by turning up their self-confidence!  At any rate, when you part ways with those you’ve come into contact with, let them feel a refreshing just because it was you they served.  And remember, we don’t always know what kind of things are going on in a person’s life.  That rude customer service person may have gotten news just hours before that his or her child has cancer.  There may be a divorce, or terrible money worries, or an abuse going on in the home.  Don’t return rudeness for rudeness.  It’s hard sometimes, but you can do it!

If you have a choice to under- or over-, always over-communicate.  You may get on someone’s nerves by overdoing it, but you’ll not vex him or her nearly as bad as if you fail to communicate at all and cause a meltdown in right order.  Think like Christ…the Word tells us that we have the MIND of Christ.  Let me encourage you to pray for good communication skills; and if you’re a leader, grab hold of the horns of the altar and tarry till God anoints you with those skills!   A great resource is a prayer on Developing Good Communication Skills, written by my dear friend, Germaine Copeland in her series “Prayers that Avail Much.”  Here’s a link to prayer at her website.

Listen, Heed, Move

PillarOfFireTherefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard, lest at any time we should let them slip.  Hebrews 2:1

How critical is it that we move with the voice of God? I’m pretty sure we don’t know the answer to that question; for if we did, we’d be so much more attentive.

In the wilderness, God protected His Hebrew people with a pillar of twofold phenomenon: the cloud by day, the fire by night. By day, His cloud was a visible banner that went before them; but think of all the other things that cloud was capable of! It could shield them from the burning desert sun, even block the view of the enemy if necessary. By night, it was a bright luminary that could not be missed in times when their trek required after-dark travel. It radiated warmth against the cold desert nights. No doubt, to their enemies, a wall of fire was a frightening and intimidating warning to back off!

But this pillar didn’t operate on the people’s schedule. It was as much a test of obedience as it was a beacon to follow to the Promised Land. There were times when God chose to park and stay a while–times some of them may have preferred to just keep moving instead of having to unpack and set up camp. Other times, when they were content to stay in a particular area, God might decide to start moving again. There wasn’t an option. God didn’t say, “I’m going to go ahead of you…just catch up when you feel like it.” No, He was their guide, their map, and their only hope of survival. They weren’t traveling a well-worn freeway equipped with GPS and road signs that said, “Next watering hole 150 miles.” A people not nomadic by culture, they had to rely totally on Him to help them deal with movement…that is, after being enslaved for 400 years!

So what does that say to us about the importance of our attentiveness to God’s Word and His voice? We are in the same place of need. We were a people in bondage, and we aren’t used to navigating in strange territory.  When the responsibility of walking in freedom gets tough sometimes, bondage beckons for us to return.  Bondage was hell, but we were used to it. We may, at times, look back and think it was easier because it was consistently bad. Still, we can’t go back. Oh technically we could; we could listen to the voice of the enemy wooing us back. “Come back to the leeks and garlic! Come back to bread and meat and a roof over your head. Come back to a steady job and neighbors you were accustomed to! It’s not so bad!” The enemy would of course laugh at us and slam the cell door shut the moment we stepped into his lair. And just like institutionalized hard criminals who commit a crime just to go back to their familiar society, we could go back to Egypt.

But…even if we were to wrangle free a second time, how long would it take us to retrace our steps and find the Cloud? How fast could our feet carry us as we doubled back, trying to remember which landmarks we passed on the way when we were first liberated?

Perhaps I’m overshooting in my example. Even if you don’t plan on going back to Egypt, there is a great price to pay for choosing not to move with the pillar.

How many times do we sleep in on a Sunday, or ignore the Holy Spirit’s urging to lay down our petty toys and get alone with God through the week, or leave the Word gathering dust on the coffee table? We won’t know until we get to the Bema just what these diversions cost us. I would say this to you: the opportunity you passed up to sit under anointed preaching or teaching, that one phone call you chose not to return, that one time when you failed to take the high road, that one opportunity that sounded good but seemed to require too much sacrifice…that choice on that one given date could’ve set your destiny back by months, by years!

And what about just your physical survival?  I interviewed RIck and Cathy Simpkins years ago, after her first bout with cancer. They shared that the whole key to her survival became a matter of daily listening for God’s voice. What would seem to others as arbitrary turns in the road were, in fact, them responding to the suddenlies of God’s urging. He led them on a carefully-timed pathway to her healing. He directed every turn in their journey. At times it seemed as if she was ricocheting between treatment plans and doctors, but in the end, it became clear why. Their urgent advice was, don’t miss the voice of God! Keep your ear tuned to hear Him! Get under good leadership and instruction and walk under authority. She got nine extra years of life out of this choice to remain steadfast; got to see her two grandchildren born, got to minister to and help many more people, build a home, travel, and live with the man she loved. Had they given in to despair, or failed to seek His counsel, the alternative was probably not good.  What could you do with extra years of life?  Could you afford to sacrifice even one of the years you now have?

So, if you knew that your very life depended on this next encounter with God, wouldn’t you go out of the way to ensure that you didn’t miss it? You’d set your clock, clear your calendar, toss the excess overboard, and wait as long as it took! You’d shush every other voice that threatened to drown out the Still, Small One. I’m urging you, whatever you have to do, don’t let the pillar start moving without you. God is merciful and full of grace…we can make critical errors and still be just as saved. However, those lapses in judgment can turn a two week journey into forty years.  He redeems time for us, absolutely; He is the author of the Plan B of our lives when we get it wrong.  But there’s seldom if ever been a time when someone got the exact same outcome as if he or she would’ve simply obeyed or sought God’s voice to start with.  As a result of our foolishness or laziness, we may lose some souls along the way we were meant to harvest. We may wind up in a lesser rank of advancement than we otherwise might’ve gotten, had we been on time. We for sure will have our regrets if we miss that critical hour of our visitation, that one seemingly just-like-every-other-day that was in fact our tipping point.

Listen for Him, run hard after Him, no matter what it takes. The hour is late; there’s not a lot of time for playing catch-up. Remember the five foolish who tried and weren’t able to get back there in time, all because they failed to be prepared for the most important moment of their lives.

Listen.  Heed.  Move.

Resisting the Spirit of Despair — A Prayer of Deliverance

push back“We are experiencing trouble on every side, but are not crushed; we are perplexed, but not driven to despair; we are persecuted, but not abandoned; we are knocked down, but not destroyed…” (2 Corinthians 4:8-9 NET)

My prayer today is for those whose trials of life seem like more than you can endure. I understand fully what it is like to be stressed easily. I’m a quiet-natured person who tends to hold in my feelings to the boiling point. On the outside I am cool as a cucumber but inwardly, my cares and worries and stress can be chewing holes in my soul. Then, at the least convenient time possible, I’ve been known to show my vulnerability. Our mouths eventually betray us if we are focused on the negative or if our mentality is one of despair!

Our only defense is God’s Word, and our only righteous boldness is through the Holy Spirit. But that isn’t bad…that’s good in a FOOLPROOF way! When our defense is coming from God and not our own at-times weak abilities, we don’t have to wonder whether we are going to survive. God, our strength and the One Who goes before us in battle, will meet the enemy first and He will wave the victory banner right in Satan’s face. Take a deep breath, and pray with me. We are about to enter into a state of rest–spiritually, mentally, physically, and emotionally too.

Father, we come to You today asking You to throw up a shield that guards our speech from the ears of the enemy. We are hearing the taunts and suggestions and mockings of the devil, who would try to drown out Your voice…but Jesus said, “My sheep hear my voice and another they will not follow.” He didn’t say we would never hear other voices, but He did say that we would recognize and follow HIS. We magnify You today and tune our ears to listen for Your guidance.  We are determined that our speech will not betray us and give the enemy a foothold.  May only You hear our distress call and not the devourer…we know You stand ready to rescue Your children!

Help us to become glass-half-full people instead of glass-half-empty! Help us to crave Your Word and to dig in to its strength when we are hit headlong with bad circumstances. We realize that it takes no effort whatsoever to become obsessed with bitter, jaded, selfish, negative thoughts…but we are followers of Christ. Therefore, we have the MIND of Christ, and for that reason, we have a choice. We plead the blood of Jesus over our mind, will, and emotions.

When the devil shows us the bad, help us instead to focus on ways in which we are blessed. When he tells us that our circumstances are permanent and that we are trapped with no way to ever be happy again, remind us that to everything there is a season. We can even come to understand, as Paul, that what we are wrestling now are “light and momentary afflictions” in light of eternity. When we are physically feeling too weary and whipped to put up a fight, send Your ministering spirits to aid and strengthen us. We can trust You. Help us not to be angry and resentful for the season we find ourselves in at this time…and if anger and resentment must be felt, may we turn those emotions into prayer bombs launched against darkness. The origin of trouble is in the spirit realm; help us to stop warring against people, when these battles must be fought on a different battleground.

Father, help us to gird up our minds and to stop courting those things which invite depression and despair. Give us a distaste for movies, music, even news channels or foods that tamper with our state of well-being. Make us aware of what pushes our anxiety buttons, and give us the good sense to walk away from drama every time it tries to let itself into our lives. Curb our appetite for over-stimulation, and teach us to live in simplicity once again. May we value quiet time with You. May we learn to politely say NO to the world’s endless list of favors. Help us to learn from Solomon’s experience when he summed all that chasing after worthless things up to just that–worthless, meaningless pursuits. Help us to stick with fearing You and keeping Your commandments. Help us to stick to loving You first, wholeheartedly, then loving others as ourselves. There is no sorrow attached to the blessings You give us. Your blessings make us rich in ways money can and cannot buy.

Today we cast our burdens upon You, because You care for us. Remind us of that. When we are tempted to dig our burdens back out of the heap and take them home, rebuke us! Thank you for fresh mercy for today, for grace to cover our shame, and for Your Word which is the winning argument to every accusation of our enemy. Thank You for Your joy…the joy of our salvation, the joy which is our strength. Thank You for Your joy even on days we don’t particularly feel happy and satisfied! Thank You for a spirit of laughter to overtake us and wash away the heaviness in our hearts. Medicate us with laughter and lightheartedness as we stretch toward Your light and away from the darkness of our circumstances. Prepare that table for us in the presence of our enemies…so that the enemy is scratching his head saying, “Right in the middle of my worst attack, they’re having a joyous feast???”

We submit to You and in doing so, we make our lives a very inhospitable place for the enemy to camp out. Instead of running toward us, he runs away. The heat of having to hear us quote the Word is more than the spirits of wickedness want to expose themselves to. It reminds them of their own despair in the very near future!

Father, we lift our hands to heaven and receive Your strength. We are that tree in Psalm 1, deeply rooted by the river of water, bearing fruit, covered in leaves, strong, healthy, thriving, fixed, and stable. We do not stand in the way of sinners, nor sit in the seat of the scornful! We toss out sarcasm and carnality and instead we delight in You and what Your Word says. Our circumstances will NOT dictate our level of thankfulness and peace. When the circumstances are resistant or slow to change, You will work on our hearts instead…so that we can say that we are content no matter what state we’re in.  When we can say that, nothing can move us out of our center of peace! In Jesus’ name, amen.

Post-It Notes of Remembrance

IMG_3956My mind today is on my friend Cathy, who was one of the bravest and most stubbornly faith-filled women I’ve ever known.  Cathy may have left here sooner than those of us who loved her would’ve allowed…but her short life was not shadowed over with a spirit of grumbling and complaining.  She had a thing about Post-it notes, and she didn’t care one bit to litter her beautiful home with them.  Scriptures, prayer requests, blessings to give thanks for, Cathy would have notes on mirrors, door frames, refrigerator, walls…wherever they’d stick.  They were her deliberate effort to maintain a grateful heart, right thoughts in her memory and on her lips.  It worked.  I watched a woman fighting for her life who made room for jubilant thanksgiving and praise of her God, and it humbled me.  It made my petty groanings seem a lot less significant when she’d say of her own major obstacles, “Hardly nothing.”  I’m trying to get a little less stingy with my Post-it notes; and because her friendship is one of those blessings I’m honored to remember, she is getting her own note on my wall.  Today’s devotional doesn’t start out on a sad note at all…I’m just integrating a bit of very important nostalgia to support the idea of remembering one’s blessings.

The reason why God established the feast days for the children of Israel is to help them remember.  You might ask, “How could anyone forget miracles like watching the parting of the Red Sea…or the deliverance from the bondage of Egypt…or the passing by of the angel of death?” Don’t be too quick to judge!  If you do not consciously make room in your life for thanksgiving, celebration, and remembrance, you too will forget your miracles when faced with another mountain. Why, we do it all the time…but for the grace of God and the Holy Spirit jogging our memory, we’d become plumb full of ingratitude, forgetfulness, complaining, wishing for what we don’t already have, bitterly living in the past, coveting other people’s blessings.

You are looking at a bill in this morning’s mail that you have no earthly idea how you’ll pay…but shift your focus back to the last time God sent provision right when you needed it. The medical report the doctor’s office just gave you is not at all what you were wanting to hear…but don’t be overwhelmed by today’s trouble when there’s a memory of a previous healing begging to be unlocked.   It’s practically screaming through the soundproof glass, “Wait!  Wait, you forgot all about ME!  Let me out of here and let’s talk!”  Shut off the distresses of the moment, right now. If but only in your mind, place them in a tucker tote and put them in a corner out of your way. You can still deal with them, but for the moment, set them aside. It sounds elementary I know, but please don’t be insulted by the simplicity of what I’m going to suggest next–I’m not downplaying your serious needs. Get a piece of paper and begin to list some things from the past which God did for you “in the nick of time.” Add to that list the blessings you already have. You might have to press through pain to get there, but list what’s good. If your left leg’s hurting, praise Him that your right leg isn’t.

There’s an old hymn that says “I can take you to the time, I can take you to the place, where the Lord saved me, by His wonderful grace.” A major weapon of spiritual warfare is that determination to remember the victories. Maybe you don’t remember the exact date or place when something happened…write it down anyway. It will be the testimony that begins with, “There was that time when______.” It will be no less powerful! God’s not like an angry spouse who’s upset that you forgot the anniversary…His reasoning for you setting that time to remember is more for YOUR benefit than His. Anyway, make that list. If you know specific days on the calendar, find some way to commemorate them. Jot them in the margins of your Bible, or Post-it notes on the cork board, whatever. We mark everything else on our calendar from mortgage due dates to doctor appointments…make some room for good things! Whenever May 22 rolls around again and you’ve got even a small story of thankfulness that coincides with that date, make an all-out celebration of it. Today, you might say to others, marks 17 years since the doctor gave me six months to live! Next Thursday marks 2 years when God saved us from losing our business. Or, I’ll always rejoice in April because that’s when I got a letter of acceptance to a university that by all human reasoning, I shouldn’t have been able to attend. Or, it was on a New Year’s Eve 30 years ago when such-and-such relative tried to take his own life, but God spared him. I can’t tell your stories because I don’t know them all, but if you’ll sweep today’s troubling circumstances to the side for just a bit, you have some incredible victories you NEED to relive. You need the strength from those memories to inspire you to forge ahead in today’s trials.

Yes, you need to make a big deal of these things. Who cares if someone else doesn’t want to have a party with you? You have a party with God! Recently, Dana and I started a journal of blessings. Oh, we might not post to it every day, but we’ve gotten into the practice of talking about blessings at night before we go to sleep, and he has me jot them down. Sometimes I go back through and read a few entries. It might be a major healing, or it might be thanks that God helped me to change a faucet under our sink without it leaking. On either end of the wow spectrum, these blessings are worth remembering and giving thanks for all over again!

What has He done for YOU–past or present–that’s worth a celebration? It’s time to put on the garment of praise and ditch that spirit of heaviness!  Grab the calendar, grab the pad of sticky notes, and encourage yourself in the Lord.  He’s worthy of praise, and His loving kindness is so worth the remembrance.

“Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits: Who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases; Who redeemeth thy life from destruction; who crowneth thee with lovingkindness and tender mercies; Who satisfieth thy mouth with good things; so that thy youth is renewed like the eagle’s.” –Psalm 103:2-5

Dry Bones, Hear the Word of the Lord! (Bible-Based Healing Confession Over Disorders of Bones/Joints)

xray-humanSon of man, can these bones live? I know that Ezekiel 37 passage is a vision concerning the rebirth of the nation of Israel; but I want to share a healing confession based on Ezekiel 37. You and I are going to target arthritis, joint/disk/connective tissue issues, crippling diseases, and pain-causing diseases in your framework. Confess the Scriptures and believe that you’re about to see a change. (I may add this to the bone and joint chapter of future reprints of CALL THOSE THINGS.  Pray with me…AND SHARE, SHARE, SHARE! Lord, use this prayer to unlock healing and let us hear testimonies of what You are doing in lives!)

1The hand of the Lord was on me, and he brought me out by the Spirit of the Lord and set me in the middle of a valley; it was full of bones. 2 He led me back and forth among them, and I saw a great many bones on the floor of the valley, bones that were very dry. 3 He asked me, “Son of man, can these bones live?” I said, “Sovereign Lord, you alone know.” FATHER, YOU ALREADY KNOW THE CONDITION OF MY BODY; BUT YOU ALSO KNOW WHAT YOUR WORD IS CAPABLE OF DOING WHEN MY BODY DOESN’T COOPERATE. YOU ARE ASKING ME IF I BELIEVE MY BODY IS CAPABLE OF REGENERATION. YOU’RE NOT ASKING THE MEDICAL COMMUNITY WHETHER MY BONES CAN LIVE AGAIN…YOU’RE ASKING ME! I ANSWER BACK TO YOU, LORD, “YES! MY BONES CAN LIVE!” I AGREE WITH YOU IN PRAYER, LORD, AND I LINE MY CONFESSION UP WITH YOUR WORD. WITH YOU, ALL THINGS ARE POSSIBLE, ESPECIALLY SINCE MY HEALING HAS BEEN ALREADY PURCHASED AT THE CROSS! THANK YOU FOR SOME REVERSALS, REGROWTH, AND REGENERATION THAT LEAVES MY DOCTORS SCRATCHING THEIR HEADS AND HAVING TO ADMIT THAT THIS HEALING CAME STRAIGHT FROM YOU.

4 Then he said to me, “Prophesy to these bones and say to them, ‘Dry bones, hear the word of the Lord! 5 This is what the Sovereign Lord says to these bones: I will make breath enter you, and you will come to life. 6 I will attach tendons to you and make flesh come upon you and cover you with skin; I will put breath in you, and you will come to life. Then you will know that I am the Lord.’” THANK YOU LORD, THAT EVEN THOUGH MY BONES MAY HAVE BEEN ACHING, LOSING DENSITY, LOSING CARTILAGE, OR BECOMING ARTHRITIC, YOU ARE HOVERING OVER ME AND BREATHING LIFE BACK INTO THEM! YOUR BREATH IS CAUSING OXYGEN-RICH MARROW TO FORM IN MY BONES RIGHT THIS SECOND…AND THAT MARROW IS POURING HEALTHY, LIFE-FILLED, BRAND NEW BLOOD CELLS INTO MY BLOODSTREAM! MY BONES ARE TURNING BACK TIME TO WHEN I WAS MUCH YOUNGER. I AM LIKE CALEB IN THE BIBLE, AND I SAY THAT I HAVE NOT LOST ONE OUNCE OF MY STRENGTH. I AM WELL-ABLE TO TAKE MY MOUNTAIN FROM THE ENEMY! TENDONS, JOINTS ARE REGENERATING AND GETTING RIGHT AMOUNTS OF FLUID, AND DISKS ARE RE-INFLATING IN MY SPINE! BONE SPURS ARE DISSOLVING, AND TORN LIGAMENTS ARE RE-ATTACHING AND BECOMING STRONGER THAN BEFORE MY INJURY. THERE IS A LOOSENING OF MOVEMENT. ANY DIAGNOSIS IN MY CHART THAT HAS THE WORD “DEGENERATIVE” IN IT IS NOW REVERSED, IN JESUS NAME. I THANK YOU FOR INCREASED FLEXIBILITY AND RANGE OF MOTION WITHOUT PAIN! THANK YOU THAT I AM BEGINNING TO SEE AND FEEL A CHANGE AT ONCE; THANK YOU FOR CONFIRMATION THAT YOUR WORD IS ALREADY AT WORK IN MY BODY. WHETHER YOU BRING MY HEALING GRADUALLY OR IN A “SUDDENLY” MOMENT, I TRUST YOU AND I THANK YOU FOR EVERY INCREMENT OF IMPROVEMENT!

7 So I prophesied as I was commanded. And as I was prophesying, there was a noise, a rattling sound, and the bones came together, bone to bone. 8 I looked, and tendons and flesh appeared on them and skin covered them, but there was no breath in them. THANK YOU LORD, THAT THIS CHANGE IN MY BONES ISN’T JUST IN APPEARANCE ONLY; THERE REALLY IS LIFE COMING BACK TO THEM! BLOOD CIRCULATION IS IMPROVING IN MY EXTREMITIES. MY HANDS AND FEET AND LIMBS AREN’T COLD AND NUMB, NOT ACHY OR TINGLY. THANK YOU THAT I AM NOT “EAT UP WITH CANCER;” I AM NOT “EAT UP” WITH ARTHRITIS. TO THE CONTRARY, YOUR WORD IS EATING UP THE CANCER AND THE ARTHRITIS…GOBBLING IT RIGHT UP EVERY TIME I LET YOUR WORD COME OUT OF MY MOUTH! IF THERE IS ANY MALIGNANCY HIDING IN MY BONES, THANK YOU FOR THE IMMEDIATE DEATH OF THOSE ABNORMAL CELLS. THANK YOU THAT PERFECTLY HEALTHY CELLS ARE SPRINGING UP AT ONCE WHERE COMPROMISED CELLS WERE GROWING. CANCER AND ARTHRITIS AND ALL OTHER “GROWING” DISEASES ARE FORBIDDEN TO KEEP SPREADING NOW. I HAVE APPLIED THE BLOOD OF JESUS LIKE A SUPERNATURAL WEED KILLER TO ALL THOSE DISEASES. THEY NO LONGER GET TO CHOKE THE JOY OF LIVING OUT OF ME. CANCER AND ARTHRITIS CELLS HAVE LOST THEIR ABILITY TO MULTIPLY…THEY ARE DYING OFF AS WE SPEAK! HEALING, HEALING, HEALING IS MINE!

9 Then he said to me, “Prophesy to the breath; prophesy, son of man, and say to it, ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: Come, breath, from the four winds and breathe into these slain, that they may live.’” 10 So I prophesied as he commanded me, and breath entered them; they came to life and stood up on their feet—a vast army. THANK YOU LORD, FOR CAUSING A QUICKENING TO COME IN MY WEIGHT-BEARING BONES. I CAN STAND, WALK, MAINTAIN MY BALANCE, EVEN LIFT AND CARRY WHAT I NEED TO. THANK YOU FOR STRENGTH RISING ON THOSE WHO WAIT ON YOU! YES, LORD, I AM PART OF YOUR VAST ARMY. MY BONES ARE NO LONGER VERY DRY! MY PURPOSE IS NO LONGER DEAD AND SCATTERED. EMPLOY MY HEALED BODY FOR YOUR PURPOSES IN THESE LAST DAYS…YOUR ARMY IS INCREASED BY ONE RIGHT NOW! I AM OUT OF THE INFIRMARY AND READY TO REPORT FOR DUTY, SIR!

11 Then he said to me: “Son of man, these bones are the people of Israel. They say, ‘Our bones are dried up and our hope is gone; we are cut off.’ 12 Therefore prophesy and say to them: ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: My people, I am going to open your graves and bring you up from them; I will bring you back to the land of Israel. 13 Then you, my people, will know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves and bring you up from them. 14 I will put my Spirit in you and you will live, and I will settle you in your own land. Then you will know that I the Lord have spoken, and I have done it, declares the Lord.’” THANK YOU LORD, FOR CAUSING MY LATTER DAYS TO FAR SUPERSEDE MY FORMER DAYS. YOU WILL USE ME IN WAYS THAT I WASN’T EVEN ABLE TO BE USED WHEN I WAS MUCH YOUNGER. THANK YOU FOR OPPORTUNITIES TO TESTIFY OF YOUR GOODNESS, TO LAY HANDS ON THE SICK AND TO SEE THEM RECOVER JUST AS YOU’RE CAUSING ME TO RECOVER NOW!

Thanksgiving–Making it a Holiday When We Truly ARE Thankful

Thanksgiving-DinnerBetter a bite of dry bread [eaten] in peace than a family feast filled with strife. Better to have a dish of vegetables where there is love than juicy steaks where there is hate. (Proverbs 15:17, 17:1). Holidays are challenging times! Unlike getting together to “watch the big game,” we sit opposite from one another at the table and are forced to have real conversations. For some, Thanksgiving‬ is a hallowed ‪tradition‬ fueled by happy childhood memories. For others, it becomes a source of stress and a dread of having to be around difficult family members.

I would challenge you this week–if your traditions have become too painful, stressful, expensive, or cause arguments and hard feelings among your family–make some modifications that are conducive to ‪PEACE‬! I knew a family once who hated cranberry sauce, but always opened a can and set it on the table because of tradition. Silly, huh? Well, how many times do we do that same thing but in other ways? Make some new traditions if you must…just make them good, easy, and worthwhile.

Make Thanksgiving a good memory for your family, rather than a dreaded event. Simplify your meal plans if that’s what it takes. You don’t have to serve a 250-item buffet to have a good dinner. Don’t create more stress by spending your whole month’s grocery budget on one meal. If you create an atmosphere of love and fun (and true gratitude) a dish of mac and cheese is as good as turkey and all the trimmings! And a meal eaten at a restaurant is not a crime, if that makes it special for your family–especially for the one who’s otherwise have to do all that cooking. I’ve even wondered before how fun it might be to just have sandwich fixings and just make an event of assembling a big submarine sandwich together…or a taco bar, or making pizzas together. No rule says it has to be about the turkey! Find what makes YOUR family feel thankful…and involved. Get creative about ways to get them around the table with you, rather than scattered into their rooms with their plates and an iPad. To do that, you may have to focus on family more than the food, and that’s really shifting your priorities in a positive way. What does it for your bunch? Singing and music around the piano? Board games? Old photo albums passed back and forth…reminiscent movies on the television…even decorating the Christmas tree together. There is some activity that will be fun that sets a spark of excitement for the years to follow.

Consider splitting the weekend to allow families a chance to linger longer. It’s called Thanksgiving weekend…and yet, we place a mandate on our kids to have to hurriedly eat and run at about 3 or 4 different houses, all on Thursday, to keep from causing hurt feelings. And someone will invariably get pouty…because no one actually shows up hungry when there’s a meal to have to eat every 90 minutes! (Remember the Andy Griffith Show spaghetti episode?) A lot of food gets wasted because families, unlike cows, don’t have two stomachs.  Let’s not place unreasonable expectations on our families.  It’s really not fair to them, or to us, when we use this holiday to force loyalty to our side of the family. It’s not always possible, but when the holiday can be coordinated to allow a fair amount of time that doesn’t put a damper on things, you be the in-law that makes it easy. I so appreciate my mother-in-law, Thelma Crum, for the way she always did this when she was able to cook.  She would do Thanksgiving with our family either on Friday, Saturday, or Sunday afternoon after church, so that her daughters-in-law could spend time with our own parents.  I’ll always be grateful for her wisdom in that.  People appreciate not having to play the “you love the other side of the family more than you do us” game. Word: a little advance planning can make this time a lot more memorable for all the right reasons. Don’t serve your kids a platter of prove-you-love-me-best…when divorce, marriage, grandkids, and other scenarios change the landscape of your traditions, adjust and you’ll preserve the want-to in your family. I can’t stress this enough–this week is your chance to shine to others as a beacon of being considerate of others’ feelings. If you insist on being the “favorite,” try being the most accommodating and easiest to please. That’ll earn you brownie points like no guilt trip ever could!

If this weekend or Thanksgiving Day is not the very best time, consider scheduling your feast on a non-holiday weekend; even or combining Christmas and Thanksgiving together isn’t even out of the question if it takes the stress and the pressure off everyone involved. When Dana and I wrecked five years ago, we had a combined Thanksgiving/Christmas in early February, an event that was truly marked by the gratitude each of these holidays embodies. If you have a loved one going off to war or fighting a terminal illness, plan the holiday to include him or her and do it sooner rather than later. Look at it this way, you are not anticipating the worst, you are extending your season of thankfulness even longer by spreading out the celebration to capture the most good memories you can.

Create an agreement not to argue! If there are hot-button topics that invariably cause bickering, agree in advance to have those discussions at a later time or not at all. Politics, your son’s eyebrow piercing, and the finer points of church doctrine are probably not good dinner topics. You already know what sets the powder keg off in your house, so man-up or woman-up and choose not to go there. Don’t use the Thanksgiving dinner table as a place to hone your sarcastic one-liners on your family. You don’t look more intelligent than the others when you have a snippy answer…you just look like a jerk! Don’t make them waste their holiday spending it with a jerk! Be nice just this once. It isn’t impossible. Pull your claws in for the sake of your family.  If you see a conversation getting a little too toasty, change the subject–or borrow that “par-lay” phrase from Captain Jack Sparrow and call a truce!  You’ve got all year to resolve the world’s crises…don’t try to do it today.  Enjoy some laughter.  (And may I also suggest–refrain from serving alcohol, those of you who normally do on this day.  Religious preferences aside, any libation, drug, or substance that causes ANY family member to get violent, moody, temperamental is NOT worth it.  Also, if you  have some who are recovering substance abusers, don’t wave the bottle in front of them and risk a setback.  Make an agreement that no one shows up intoxicated or leaves that way, if for no other reason, the safety and emotional well-being of the children of the household.  Please, don’t make this holiday a memory of the parents or older sister getting boozed up and making a scene. )

Finally, please don’t be wasteful. If Thanksgiving means every year you wind up with more leftovers than you can cram into your refrigerator, much of it later raked into the trash can, then it’s time to think outside the box…or in this case, outside the icebox.  Don’t cook more than you can eat in a couple days and share.  It’s so irresponsible to do so, especially if you’re doing it just to make an impressive display on the table.  You already know someone who won’t get enough to eat this week. If inviting that person to your table isn’t safe, practical, or possible, take or send some food to him or her.  Double blessing: send some food anonymously!  By keeping it low-key, you let God get the glory and you get the joy of being His covert agent of goodwill. Either way, just make sure no one goes hungry on your watch this week, even if all you are able to share is a peanut butter sandwich.  This is also a great way to teach your children about the “giving” part of Thanksgiving.  Kids love to give things…to allow them to help assemble take-out baggies of sandwiches or leftover pie is sowing some precious values into their young hearts.

I pray all of you will have a truly peaceful, blessed, uncomplicated Thanksgiving holiday this week. May God’s presence be felt in every home, and may you have more than enough. Love, light, and life!

That Your Prayers Be Not Hindered

praying hands“Wives, in the same way submit yourselves to your own husbands so that, if any of them do not believe the word, they may be won over without words by the behavior of their wives,  when they see the purity and reverence of your lives. Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as elaborate hairstyles and the wearing of gold jewelry or fine clothes.  Rather, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God’s sight.  For this is the way the holy women of the past who put their hope in God used to adorn themselves. They submitted themselves to their own husbands, like Sarah, who obeyed Abraham and called him her lord. You are her daughters if you do what is right and do not give way to fear.   Husbands, in the same way be considerate as you live with your wives, and treat them with respect as the weaker partner and as heirs with you of the gracious gift of life, so that nothing will hinder your prayers. Finally, all of you, be like-minded, be sympathetic, love one another, be compassionate and humble.  Do not repay evil with evil or insult with insult. On the contrary, repay evil with blessing, because to this you were called so that you may inherit a blessing.  For,“Whoever would love life and see good days must keep their tongue from evil and their lips from deceitful speech.  They must turn from evil and do good; they must seek peace and pursue it.  For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous and his ears are attentive to their prayer, but the face of the Lord is against those who do evil.”  — 1 Peter 3:1-12

 

I want to interject early on, that there is a difference between medical conditions which trigger certain behaviors, and spiritual conditions.  When someone is (or should be) under medical treatment and/or medications for such conditions, I would never advise you to stop treatment or counseling.  In fact, I beg of you to get checked out if you suspect you’re dealing with bipolar, depression, PTSD, or any other mental health issue that might make it easy for you to mistreat others.  The difference is, medication can help with a physical/mental condition–there is no shame in needing it–but if your problem is spiritual, you cannot medicate away a spiritual problem!  May all of us transparent with ourselves enough to know when sin is the root cause of our bad behavior–and may we aggressively do the work to get it out of our lives.

I also want to note that, this article can’t possibly take into account every single home’s unique issues.  I do want to, however, talk about just a few of them.  If these don’t touch on the particular problems, causes, and conditions in your own home, just know that I’m trying to touch a small area in a very broad issue.  Please, if you’re having problems, don’t just take my small blog post as an all-inclusive approach to dealing with them.  Consult with a qualified marriage counselor, pastor, mental health advisor, someone who can get into the finer points of your particular crisis.

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It’s not often that I start a devotional out with such a long passage of Scripture, but to condense this very important passage would not do any justice to the teaching topic I’m addressing this morning:  cruelty in the home, most notably, spousal abuse.

There aren’t many instances in Scripture where spousal abuse is recorded; yet, treating one’s family well–including (and especially) the husband or wife–is a recurring theme throughout the Scriptures.  It’s important to God. Being kind to one’s mate should be a given, right?  Yes, it should be.  There are some things God shouldn’t have to come right out and get elementary about, and yet…  He had to spell out that we not have sex with animals, with our parents/kids/near kin, etc.  If you think that mankind is inherently good, well, think again.  The human heart, without God shaping it and molding it, is desperately wicked.  When mapping out a plan for godly living, yes, He got very specific.  He knew there would be a few delinquents in the bunch who might come back later and say, “Well, no one ever told ME that a person’s not supposed to do that!”

A Double Life

A double minded man is unstable in all his ways.  Wherefore, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath:  For the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God.  James 1:8, 19-20

You cannot be cruel in your home and it not affect your life outside your home.  I knew of a man once whom everyone in the general public loved.  He was very charismatic, very accommodating to others.  He was the “open doors, help little old ladies across the street” kind of guy.  He was well respected in the business world and in the political realm; yet there was an elephant in the room.  When he went home at night, he left the nice-man suit in his car in the garage, and put on the monster costume.  He was a verbal abuser to his entire family, but especially to his wife.  It would eventually come out that on occasions he got physical with her, too.  She remained with him until her children were grown, reasoning within herself that it was ok, so long as he didn’t physically harm the kids.  Then, one day she and his children were well out of harm’s way, and everyone was shocked.  They couldn’t figure out what on earth would break up such a happy home.  Then, slowly, the stories begin to emerge about what was actually going on in that home.  The wife would confide, the kids would confide; eventually, what was such a carefully-guarded secret was all over the place.

If that weren’t a sad enough note to end this little story on, the man didn’t just go back to business-as-usual in his outside life.  With no one at home to take his frustrations out on, the monster costume was occasionally worn to work and out in the community under his clothes.  His stellar reputation went south, and though he was a man of means, he lost everything of true value.  Eventually even his financial prosperity proved to be tainted by the cruelty in his heart.

Abuse Isn’t Always Covert

Flip the situation and I’ll tell you of another.  I used to know a married couple that I absolutely hated running into.  They were friends of ours, and I didn’t dislike them, per se.  I was just always left deeply uncomfortable by the way the wife continually, and in every conversation, insulted her husband to us…right in front of him!  She would go on and on about foolish choices he made, and how if he’d only have listened to her, he wouldn’t have done them…or how he always did this wrong, or always failed in that area.  Her whole discussion would always seem to center on how superior she was to him in every way.  I could tell this man was resentful and deeply ashamed of what she was doing, and yet, the climate never seemed to change.  They had a rocky, on-again, off-again relationship.  It always felt good whenever we were able to finagle ourselves away from them!  Was that spousal abuse?  It absolutely was!

No Place for Abuse in a Christian Home!

Why am I sharing this in a devotional?  Because I see it, shamefully so, in Christian homes and not just in the homes of nonbelievers.  And yes, those stories abound as well of women who are abusers in the home.  Their outcomes are no better than this man’s.  And this situation I’ve shared with you is a secular story.  You’re seeing ones like it on the news nearly daily now.  There are countless big-time athletes and actors and celebrities who’ve lost their status because their abusive characters outside the workplace cause their employers to view them as a public relations risk.  No one wants to be associated with a bully or a thug, or even a jerk!  Even some of the best-looking actors in Hollywood have completely lost their heartthrob status when it came out that they were abusers of their spouses and families.

I wonder–knowing what an outspoken man Peter was–how and when he eventually came to the place in his walk with God where these teachings had lodged within his own heart!  Peter–the same man who wrote the above passage is the same hot-head who cut off the high priest’s servant’s ear in the Garden of Gethsemane.  He’s the same fellow who denied Jesus three times, and other major debacles of character.  Yet, he apparently at least eventually got the revelation that God values self-control in a man (and a woman).  Jesus even showed up at his house at one point to heal Peter’s mother-in-law of a fever, and she rose up afterwards and ministered to them.  A man who has relationship issues wouldn’t call Jesus to his home to heal one of his in-laws!  He’d probably do anything that he could to keep Jesus from entering his home, for fear that Jesus would sense a spirit of offense there.  Peter’s writings here would indicate that, at least in time, he understood the necessity of one’s horizontal relationships’ being in harmony to positively open up the VERTICAL relationship with God.

I’m not writing this devotional to try to shame men into becoming walked-on wimps, and I’m not writing it to tell women that they have no voice and should just be door mats to their husbands.  I’m writing it to urge you to get your houses in order…because how you treat your family matters to God.  You will be judged for it.  The fruitfulness of your hopes, dreams, and prayers depends on it, too.  If you don’t particularly like being successful, being thought well of, being blessed, being whole in mind and body, then just ignore everything I’ve said…BUT!  If you do want to have a blessed, prosperous life where everything doesn’t go to pieces, then you need to respect the conditions for blessing that God has set forth in His Word.

Common Excuses We Use Not to Change

  1.  It’s just the way I am.  I inherited this temper.  So lame!  This is the laziest excuse to let one’s emotions run the show.  You are right about one thing…without God’s help, you really can’t change.  And if you inherited a short fuse, stop bragging about it!  It’s not something to be proud of.  If you have anger issues or a personality trait that is endangering the welfare of your family, be man or woman enough to admit it before God and before a qualified marriage counselor.  Don’t wait until the damage is beyond repair.  You may not feel that bad about it now, but at some point in time, you will reap some painful things for the pain you inflict on others.
  2. It’s his/her fault that I lose it.  My spouse sets me off with that mouth!  While it’s true, our spouses can lend to the overall problem, it is still up to you to control your own spirit!  Temporarily distance yourself if you have to, rather than engaging so heatedly into discussions that you wind up saying and doing regretful things.  Back off.  Take a walk.  Better yet, pray and get into God’s Word.  Take the initiative to arrange for pastoral and qualified family counseling if you have these types of issues.  Whatever you do, don’t let that volcano of hate and anger spew into your home!
  3. He/she knows I really don’t mean it.  We always cool off eventually.  I can promise you this:  when you say hurtful things to your children or spouse, they play over and over like a broken record long after the argument is over.  Don’t be the cause of your family having to deal with the sin of unforgiveness through repeated abuse on your part!  Nothing good can come of you causing your spouse and kids to develop hard, callous hearts.  It will tell on you, eventually.
  4. As long as no one at work, church, school, or our community knows we have these problems, it should all work out ok.  You see, that’s the lie Satan plants to keep us satisfied that we still have it all under control.  Remember, God’s opinion ultimately is the most important, and if you are disobeying His guidelines for the way you treat others, you are sinning, PERIOD.  Just because no one else seems to be observing the problem, doesn’t mean that they aren’t already picking up on the bad vibes.  People aren’t that stupid, friend!  Your spouse and children have body language and many other non-verbal means of communicating to the world that you are not treating them well, even when they are trying to hide their embarrassing secret.
  5. I came from an abusive background and I didn’t turn out so bad. I’m not nearly as bad as my dad/mom.  Are you kidding?  The very fact that your own family is repeating the same nightmare in another generation is a serious problem.  What if your children’s relationships turn out to be even worse than your parents’, just because you failed to deal with it in your own life?  Yes, it’s serious.  Don’t grade yourself on a curve against others who you perceive are/were worse than you are.  Examine your life against God’s standard in His Word, and make whatever changes you need to make to live a life pleasing to Him!  Proverbs says that when a person’s ways please the the Lord, He makes even that person’s enemies to be at peace with him/her.  Righteousness and a truly right heart will positively, even miraculously, affect your ability to get along well with others.  It is truth.
  6. I don’t feel well.  My health issues make me moody and my family knows it.  Yes, they certainly do know it, and they resent being the brunt of your frustration.  And if you want their prayers, love, understanding, and support, you will try harder not to let your personal pain affect your treatment of them.  The best way to have someone actually on your side is not to turn him or her into an enemy by being an ogre!
  7. I’m just talking mean to him/her.  Since I’m not name-calling or using foul language, it’s not really verbal/emotional abuse.  Baloney, friend.  You are not that deceived!  If the way you are speaking and behaving is causing abnormal fears, manipulation, torment, sadness, depression, suicidal thoughts, resentment, self-hatred, depreciation, insults, you are not behaving like Jesus!  Yes, sometimes we have to address issues in our homes.  Things need discussed, resolved, debated, corrected, at times changed for the better of everyone involved.  Sometimes we must be iron sharpening iron…you may be instrumental in discipline in your home, but you are not called to be a verbal axe-wielder in your home.  You can have even serious, somber, firm discussions with others without stepping into a spirit of strife.  Weigh every action and word against how Jesus would handle what you’re handling, and if you are emotionally scarring another person, you need to stop it, NOW.

Initiating Change Through Prayer and Honest Self-Examination

There’s no way I can possibly cram all the helpful elements to enhancing our spousal relationships into this little blog post, but what I will do is this:  I have included a couple of prayers for spouses whose anger issues are jeopardizing their marriages.  I am proposing not anger management, but anger crucifixion!  It’s time to take these issues to the cross, once and for all.

I do want to say this, as we end on a positive note:  today is a new day.  We can repent and apologize for the sins of our past, and start from this day forward to make better choices. I so respect Larry and Tiz Huch, television ministers, for their very transparent testimony of how God restored their marriage after years of abusive behavior.  We need to see more testimonies like theirs of couples who’ve overcome the past, forgiven, and gone on to have happy marriages.  I want you to know that there is hope for you too–but you must be willing to fight the real enemy, the devil, for it!  God is ready to meet you right where you are, and His grace is sufficient.

Husbands – “Heavenly Father, I feel the pressure on every side to be in charge.  The hardest time I have holding it together is when I come home, because that’s where I want most to be able to be myself.  But Lord, I don’t like the man I see myself become when I’m around my family.  Forgive me for the horrible way I have let my anger leech into my homelife.  As the spiritual leader of our home, it says that I have spiritual issues of my own which need dealt with.  Lord, I don’t want to damage my children for future relationships!  I don’t want my wife to secretly despise me.  The truth is, I don’t know how to change and without Your help, I can’t change.  I ask You, in Jesus’ name, to break off any generational curses of parental and spousal abuse from my bloodline now.  Sever all negative ties between my family history and my own immediate family now.  If there is abuse in our lineage, let my family be the generation in which it is stopped.  Lord, shine the light of Your Word into my spirit man.  Chase the wickedness out of the corners of my soul where it loves to hide.  Father, if there is an indwelling of any unclean spirit in me or on me which influences me to verbally, emotionally, or physically abuse my wife and children, I resist it now.  I submit myself to You because Your Word says that if I will humble myself, submit to you, and resist the devil, he MUST flee from me!  Drive out every evil spirit that influences me to harm others and to harm myself.  Fill me up to overflowing with Your Holy Spirit and help me to recognize all open doors to evil in my life.  I go behind Your revelation of these things and I shut them, one by one.  In Jesus’ name, may every legal access the devil has to our home be deadbolted shut now and forevermore.  Father, as I repent and submit myself to Your Word, I will also repent to and before my family for the wrong things I have said and done to them.  Your Word says that anger rests in the bosom of fools.  I don’t want to be a fool.  I want to love my family the way You do, and to protect my spouse the way Christ shields and covers His Church.  If I cannot see substantial changes coming, I will be man enough to initiate marital counseling.  I will not hide our problems behind the guise of a Christian home, but I will get help and I will stop the abuse from perpetuating to another generation.  Help me to love like You love.  Thank You for forgiving me and extending Your grace and mercy over our situation now.”

Wives –  “Heavenly Father, You have heard my silent cries for help, and I know that it is not Your plan for my family to be harboring this ugly secret.  Verbal and physical abuse are not attributes of the Spirit-filled!  These ugly manifestations have no place in our home.  I look to You for wisdom to be able to be the thermostat of our home.  While it is not right for my husband to abuse me, I know that I need to recognize “triggers” that provoke outbursts.  I can’t always prevent bad moods and temper flares from occurring, but You can enable me to divert certain situations before they even occur.  Lord, forgive me for times when I nag or boss or belittle my husband.  Forgive me for sometimes not resisting the urge to push his buttons by inserting a little dig or subtle insult into discussions.  While it is wrong for him to mistreat me, it is equally wrong for me to dare him to do so.  I will set a watch upon the words of my mouth.  I will learn to give soft answers that turn away wrath, and I will set in motion a spiritual mood change in our home through praise and worship, thanksgiving, prayer, reading and speaking Your Word aloud, and through the cleansing of evil spirits from my household in intercession!  Help me to proactive in this area.  Help me to build up my husband’s spirit man and not to tear him down.  I repent of every time I have emasculated him through open insults, rebellion, and belittling him in front of others–especially our children.  Help me to have new-found respect for him, and help me to forgive.  Oh, Lord, how I need Your help there!  Cause my moods to come into harmony in ways that affect his moods more positively.  Your Word says that my lifestyle has the power to win him over to You just by the witness I live before him!  No amount of preachiness or nagging could ever influence him like seeing Your love pour out of me.  Help me to identify characteristics in my personality which might cause arguments (complaining, griping, negative words, insults, sarcasm, bossiness), and to put these things on the altar for good!  Make me that kind of woman, Father, so full of Your Holy Spirit that he cannot resist the pull toward You.  I will apologize to him for my shortcomings, and I will take the high road to reconcile whenever we have disagreements.  I will not assume that he can read my mind!  If I have concerns, I will speak gently to him about them and allow Your Holy Spirit to convict him in those areas.  Lord, I ask You in Jesus’ name to break generational curses that come into our family from my side of the bloodline.  Whether emotional disorders, addictions, abuse or being enslaved by those who abuse, or any other trap of Satan to perpetuate damage into our children, I stop it now by submitting our heritage to You!    Doors that You have made me responsible to shut, I will close.  I will set no wicked thing before my eyes, and I will not entertain the foolish advice of a broken world on how to conduct my household affairs!  I look to You, O God, and I pray that, should our marriage require counseling, that You will pair my husband and me with the right counselor(s) who can help us to heal and move forward.  And please, if remaining in our home is endangering the safety and well-being of myself and our children–if You see that my spouse is unwilling to be helped and will go on harming us–give me the discernment and courage to know when and where to flee for protection.  In Jesus’ name I ask, Amen!”

 

Thankfulness–Breaker of Hope Deferred

Proverbs 13:12 Bread.jpgtells us that postponed hope sickens the heart. How many people are suffering in their health–or even already gone to the grave–because of a state of hopelessness?

I want each of you to ponder this and begin to confess, “I choose to be happy NOW. Not later, when the right job, the right mate, the weight loss, the respect and the education and the money come. My contingency for happiness isn’t bound up in a lottery ticket mentality, where happiness might get to happen later IF per next-to-nothing chance, I get everything I hope for.”

One of Satan’s cruelest schemes is that of deferred hope, because it’s always in the future with no acquisition date stamped on it. In that setting, only fantasy occupies the mind–for anyone else’s life MUST be more interesting than one’s own, right?

Don’t let the evil one convince you that the ideal life is the one you aren’t in! He will keep you running from one relationship to another, one high to another, one futile pursuit and then another and another. You’ll live inside a fictitious story where you spend all your days, as Ecclesiastes says, chasing “vanities.” Even when you ARE running over with favor and blessing, you won’t see it because you’ll be still focused on what you don’t have yet. Without meaning to be–and without seeing it–you’ll become miserably self-centered, trapped inside the devil’s funhouse where every reflection of your life is distorted and perverted. Not good enough.

How on earth does one stop deferring hope? It is, after all, a choice! You break the cycle first by taking on the spirit of thanksgiving. As hypocritical as that might sound, you call the devil’s bluff even before you SEE your own life as a great place to be. You zero in on even the trivial, tiny things if necessary; and praise God for those instead of lamenting things which aren’t so wonderful at present. Believe me when I tell you, God knows your heart! He isn’t going to be insulted when you do this. He knows the difference between sarcasm and a true attempt to return to a spirit of thanksgiving. If your foot is hurting, thank Him that your ear isn’t.

Jesus lived in a human body too. It would’ve been much easier to live out His days as a normal, nondescript fellow with the biblical equivalent of the American Dream. The wife, kids, the dog, the picket fence. He also knew that the key to not becoming disillusioned with the burdens He bore was to remain in the place of thanksgiving. His prayers began with, “Father, I thank You that_____.”

From what many historians believe, Mary probably long outlived Joseph. As the oldest, the responsibility to support her and to raise younger siblings would have fallen to Jesus. He could’ve wrestled with “hope deferred” as He labored away, day in and day out, to put food on the table instead of being out there fulfilling His destiny. The human side of Him may have wondered, “Am I ever going to get beyond just helping my folks and on to REAL ministry?” But you know, the side of Him which connected to His Father knew that what He was doing in those preparatory days WAS real ministry! He learned compassion and selflessness while helping wipe noses and pack water. Time He spent poring over the law and the prophets, in prayer and meditation, and in the place of solitude, and in the place of serving His family well, were all investments for what would become a 3 1/2 year blitz of ministry that culminated in Him saying, “It is finished!” at the cross–not, “This is unfair, my life has been disappointing, it is UNFINISHED. I want to reinvent myself and be like the characters on my favorite TV show!”

There have been many times when, going through hard seasons, I dreamed of hopping on a plane with a new name and identity, and just starting all over again. There’ve been times when I felt like the biggest waste of potential EVER. I’ve known for some time now that when I catch myself drifting away to that place, my thankfulness is leaking out. I immediately try to switch gears and reassess. Have I listened to the world telling me all I’m not, or am I instead peering at my reflection in the Word to see me conforming to the image of Jesus?

When we say that our current state is not our IDEA of where we want to be, then we are in the place of hope deferred…and yes, it’s just an idea. Shake yourself with this hard but vital truth!  If you get every part of your “idea” of what it takes to make you happy, you still won’t be happy unless you are already choosing to have a heart of gratitude in any state.   Our mission statement may be more than “half a bubble off plumb” when placed against our actual MISSION. It’s time to take our minds off the “if only I were richer, thinner, younger, older, more educated, beautiful/handsome, then my life would be better” merry-go-round, and make today about what we actually have in our hands. Do as Jesus did concerning feeding the multitude. Ask, “what do I have in my hands?” and then hold it up, give thanks for it, bless it, and put it to use. You’re no more cheated for that allotment of resources you have than Jesus was, when He held up and gave thanks for five dinner rolls and a couple of sardines, right in front of the astonished people He was about to bless with the feast of a lifetime!

Remember–remain thankful even when it feels silly to be thankful for your little bit. It doesn’t matter what YOU have, it’s what HE has…but He will require you to present to Him what you have first. Trade your hope deferred for faith infused! He will bless you more for thankfully using what you have–your ordinary, ho-hum life in your average or below-average body, less-than-perfect teeth, short resume’, incomplete education, not-so-dream job, biological click-ticking self–than if you were to get to swap lives with any other person on earth. Bless and utilize what you have; because in so doing, you short-circuit the endless-loop of the accuser who says you have too little to ever be effective (or happy)! Stop comparing yourself to that other person who already has what you wish you did–you may think you really want IT, but mostly what you’re wanting is to shut off feeling as if you’re a disappointment. Stop it. That other person isn’t having things as perfect as you think…especially if he or she is still motivated by that same need for approval that you’re wrestling.

God will take your offering of what you have, pour the oil of anointing on it, set it ablaze with favor you couldn’t have possibly worked diligently enough to earn, and leave you speechless at what He has done with your tiny part! So, does a spirit of thankfulness REALLY do all that? Is it really the breaker of hope deferred? Yes! On the day you grasp this–take your eyes off yourself and place them upon God–you will poise yourself for the miraculous! Refocus every single day if you have to, because this is one of the most powerful tools of spiritual warfare you will ever pull out of your bag. Get this right and watch your life begin to change in a major way…and those things you don’t see changing will start mattering to you a whole lot less in light of what IS.

Emboldening Your Child in the Face of Christian Persecution

Romans 1 v 16“God blesses those who are persecuted for doing right, for the Kingdom of Heaven is theirs.  God blesses you when people mock you and persecute you and lie about you and say all sorts of evil things against you because you are my followers. Be happy about it! Be very glad! For a great reward awaits you in heaven. And remember, the ancient prophets were persecuted in the same way.  You are the salt of the earth. But what good is salt if it has lost its flavor? Can you make it salty again? It will be thrown out and trampled underfoot as worthless.  You are the light of the world—like a city on a hilltop that cannot be hidden. No one lights a lamp and then puts it under a basket. Instead, a lamp is placed on a stand, where it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your good deeds shine out for all to see, so that everyone will praise your heavenly Father.”  Matthew 5:10-16

We all try to shield our children from being bullied and from being a bully, and as well we should.  No one likes to encounter the milk money monster who waits on the curb every school morning for that one intimidated child.  And, while the clique of mean-spirited girls who pick on that one whose clothes and hair are not as nice as theirs may get some snickers of approval from other kids, they will carry the brand of a bully and a snob for the rest of their lives in the memory of that person whose life they made a living hell.  Some things may be more called-out nowadays than they used to be; but all-in-all, not much has changed across the generations.

In this society where tolerance and acceptance are being talked about night and day, there’s a new form of soft persecution going on in the Christian faith:  the pressure to avoid having to be recognized as the “outsider.”  Believers have fundamental moral codes which come from the Word of God; and cultural relevance takes a backseat when it comes to truth.   When truth is priority in a person’s life who walks among peers with only self-serving motivations, there’s bound to at some point be a dividing line.  Children are hearing so much about tolerance and acceptance (and in some ways it’s a good thing) that they’re feeling a pressure to do whatever it takes to be tolerated and accepted–including compromise in the area of their faith.   We will probably continue to see that dogma of inclusion being strengthened toward other belief systems and choked off on the side of evangelical Christianity.  It’s an unusual time, the last days…where evil is called good, and if you embrace good, you’re considered evil, closed-minded, bigoted, prudish, and a reject.

As a parent, what you do need to teach your child early-on is that it is ok to be rejected for Christ’s sake…and the best way you can enforce that in your child’s life is for him or her to see you modeling it in yours.  If you’re becoming increasingly tight-lipped about the Gospel–if you’re hiding or relaxing your faith in order to get promoted on the job or accepted in certain social circles–that’s the example your child sees and will probably follow.  Just as we teach our children the beautiful truths of God’s Word, we must also be transparent with them about the reason why Jesus wound up being crucified.  Though it was ultimately the plan of God to purchase our salvation, it was carried out at the hands of men who hated Christ’s teachings and wanted to silence Him at all costs.  As our children get a little more mature, we shouldn’t conceal from them that there have been martyrs throughout the history of our faith who bravely gave their lives rather than deny Jesus.  Don’t be afraid that your child is too young to “get” the message of the cross.  I mean, look at the things you allow him or her to watch on tv!  Even if you’re very protective about what you already low, children manage to be exposed to sex, violence, drugs, and the stark ugliness of life far sooner they should.  They know much more than we did at their age!  So in the matter of eternity?  If they can handle the movies and video games available nowadays, I think they can more than handle the truth.

Have more than one heart-to-heart with your child about boldness in his or her Christian faith!  Reassure your child that, if persecution, bullying, or exclusion should happen, he or she has nothing to be ashamed of.  Certainly, we need to defend our children when someone’s treating them unfairly; but God does reward the tenacity of His children when they refuse to compromise for the sake of popularity.  There are life lessons your child will be confronted with soon enough; and you need to have prepared him or her to trust in God for His protection and vindication.

Whenever you as a parent are pressured to allow your child to participate in events, parties, even holidays that go against your Christian conscience, please, hit your knees before you make foolish decisions.  Your child may get teased for not being allowed to go to a seance, a sexually-explicit or contraversial movie, or a party where alcohol may be being served to minors; but I promise you, you’re not doing your child any justice by violating conscience to avoid peer pressure.  If your children see you ashamed of the Gospel, they’ll have no hesitation in being ashamed of Jesus themselves.  The subject of persecution is by no means a fun one to address, but remind your children, when they experience difficult times, of the story in Acts Chapter 5, where the apostles were arrested, publicly humiliated, commanded not to use the name of Jesus (sound familiar?), even beaten for their faith, then went away rejoicing that they’d been counted worthy to suffer for the sake of Christ.  A very unpopular message in today’s world–but it’s at the heart of the very faith we embrace!

There are going to be hard times.  There may even be times when your child messes up, or gives in to peer pressure, or does as Peter did–denies Jesus three times before the rooster crows.  Strive to have an open enough relationship with him or her to talk about these things openly…and help your child quickly recover and move forward from stumblingblocks.  If our children know they can come to us and openly confess their sins, and receive forgiveness not only from Jesus but from their parents, they’ll run to that place of sanctuary called “home.”  When your child does encounter persecution for the sake of his or her faith, as a parent, be your child’s cheerleader!  Be an encourager, a praiser, and quick to show your child you’re proud of him or her for being resolute in the faith.  Reinforce that meekness isn’t weakness.  Christians don’t storm around angrily demanding that people celebrate us, not as the world does.  Teach by example.  We can share Jesus without being obnoxious or overbearing.  We can pray for others without constantly hounding them or looking down on them.  It’s very important that we be salt and light in this lost world–something our children can see and emulate.  We must remind our kids as well as ourselves that our calling is not merely to fly under the radar and escape this world undetected; we are called to shine a light to a very lost world.

We do need to teach our children the hard lessons of life concerning a bold witness, but not just so they’ll be a little tougher.  In truth, if we can’t help them remain steadfast under the relatively benign persecutions of our American culture–the shunning, the exclusion, the teasing–how can we ever expect them to be bold enough, should a swordsman ever stand over them and demand a recantation of their faith or else suffer execution?  I pray that we never see the same horrors as our Christian brothers and sisters on the other side of the globe; but that’s something we cannot guarantee we won’t encounter in our lifetimes.  We should teach our kids that they can put their trust in God to keep them safe; but we also must gradually prepare them not to be jaded by the cruel reality of the world in which we live.  There is an enemy who, 2000 years later, still vehemently opposes and despises the cross and all who call on the name of Jesus.  May our children be taught by us to remain strong, unwavering; a next generation of the faithful who may very well be the last generation before the end of days!